rails-devel — List for discussion of Rails development

[Rails-devel] Patchfiles

[Freek D. <sf_...@ma...>]

Hi,

I recently downloaded 18xx rails, and like it (even though I only own 
1856, which is not yet complete).

I like to help, though I have only very limited time on my hands. 
However, I might be able to make minor adjustments for things I run 
into. For example in the UI, it is sometimes beneficial to see more 
information (e.g. how many trains the bank still has, the upgrade value 
of a city while laying a tile, stricter tile-laying rules -companies can 
now place unreachable tile-, saving of preferences between games, 
unlimited tiles -a variant I prefer to play-, perhaps even automatic 
route calculation)

So two questions: what are the coding rules? In particular to spacing? 
I'm most customed to Python at the moment (not Java, sorry), and I'm 
getting nuts by the mix of spaces, 3-space tabs, 4-space tabs and 
8-space tabs. Please pick one (I don't care which) and be consistent.

Secondly, how should I submit these minor patches? Sending them to the 
list, uploading to sourceforge, ...?

For starters, here is a 4-line patch so I can specify a preferred game 
type in my.properties.

Regards,
Freek Dijkstra

PS: I'm using Mac OS X, and made a Xcode project (instead of using 
Eclipse). If anyone is interested, let me know.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

All done.

I only had to tweak the CSS a little to make it work in IE.
Making the page validate was simple enough as well.
A good learning experience for me.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

On 5/18/08, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
>  A few things outstanding:
>  1. I just asked John Tamplin for permission to use the tile images.

Received. It turns out that John is on this list anyway. Thanks John!

>  3. I have to test it in Internet Explorer, which I do not have at home.

It looks terrible! I'll have to do some more work on it.

-- 
Iain

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 2:05 PM, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> Thanks guys. I will update the page, but at the moment it is read-only
> and my rights do not extend to changing it. Please can you give me
> read/write access?

Done.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

Thanks guys. I will update the page, but at the moment it is read-only
and my rights do not extend to changing it. Please can you give me
read/write access?

A few things outstanding:
1. I just asked John Tamplin for permission to use the tile images.
2. The HTML does not quite validate yet. I have to fiddle around with
the CSS a little.
3. I have to test it in Internet Explorer, which I do not have at home.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 2:15 AM, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> I restored the structure and changed the design.
>
> http://cheyne.net/tmp/rails/
>
> What do you think? All feedback welcome as I'm a rank amateur.
>


That looks fantastic.   Great work.

Feel free to update the homepage with your design.


---Brett.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Erik V. <eri...@hc...>]

Looks fine to me. 
Erik.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: rai...@li... 
> [mailto:rai...@li...] On Behalf 
> Of Iain Cheyne
> Sent: Sunday 18 May 2008 10:16
> To: Development list for Rails: an 18xx game
> Subject: Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page
> 
> I restored the structure and changed the design.
> 
> http://cheyne.net/tmp/rails/
> 
> What do you think? All feedback welcome as I'm a rank amateur.
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------
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Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

I restored the structure and changed the design.

http://cheyne.net/tmp/rails/

What do you think? All feedback welcome as I'm a rank amateur.

Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

On Wed, May 14, 2008 at 2:21 AM, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> On 5/12/08, brett lentz <wak...@gm...> wrote:
>  >  >From Marco's tile designer, I export Postscript images. This is mainly
>  >  because direct export to SVG doesn't create a file that Batik will
>  >  read.
>
>  >From the descriptions above, it sounds like Rails can handle SVG
>  files. If Marco's tile designer could export files that Batik could
>  read, then maybe that would solve the problem? Maybe there could be
>  some dialogue with Marco?
>

Already tried that. Unfortunately, Marco believes that his SVG output
is correct and doesn't have the time/interest to work on updating or
fixing it.

>  --
>  Iain
>

---Brett.

Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

On 5/12/08, brett lentz <wak...@gm...> wrote:
> On Sun, May 11, 2008 at 11:53 AM, Erik Vos <eri...@hc...> wrote:
>  >  Not sure what kind of technologies in these steps you consider yourself able
>  >  to address....

Sorry, but this stuff is really out of my ability range. I'll have to
stick to writing.

>  >From Marco's tile designer, I export Postscript images. This is mainly
>  because direct export to SVG doesn't create a file that Batik will
>  read.

>From the descriptions above, it sounds like Rails can handle SVG
files. If Marco's tile designer could export files that Batik could
read, then maybe that would solve the problem? Maybe there could be
some dialogue with Marco?

-- 
Iain

Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

>
>
>  > -----Original Message-----
>  > From: rai...@li...
>  > [mailto:rai...@li...] On Behalf
>  > Of Iain Cheyne
>  > Sent: Sunday 11 May 2008 16:30
>  > To: Development list for Rails: an 18xx game
>  > Subject: Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?
>  >
>  > On 5/10/08, brett lentz <wak...@gm...> wrote:
>  > > More specifically, by "better tiles", I meant that someone needs to
>  > >  just spend some time making sure the tiles are all consistent. Make
>  > >  sure each tile is aligned to the same pixel offsets, etc.
>  > >
>  > >  It's time consuming, but it would help make the map look a little
>  > >  better, and make improving the drawing code an easier process.
>  >
>  > Please could you elaborate a bit more on that? Maybe post the tiles up
>  > somewhere with instructions? Even if I can't do it, someone else might
>  > be able to.
>  >
>  > --
>  > Iain
>  >


On Sun, May 11, 2008 at 11:53 AM, Erik Vos <eri...@hc...> wrote:
> 1. If you look into the 18xx CVS repository, under tiles, you'll find a file
>  TileDictionary.18t, which is a data store maintained by Marco Rocci's Tile
>  Designer program (see http://www.rails18xx.it/software.html). I have started
>  from Marco's base version and added a lot of game-specific tiles in the
>  course of time.
>
>  2. The program allows the export of tile pictures in various formats. We use
>  both GIF and SVG. Brett can give you any details on how exactly he has done
>  that (I think he modifies the SVG versions in some way). The resulting files
>  can also be found in CVS, under tiles/images and tiles/svg.
>
>  (For the 18EU specific tiles we use picture files obtained from John
>  Tamplin, I believe he uses a modified version of Marco's program.).
>
>  3. The GIF or SVG tile pictures are loaded, resized, rotated and rendered by
>  the Rails Java code (classes rails.ui.swing.ImageLoader and
>  rails.ui.swing.hexmap.GUITile).
>  (N.B. GIFs currently can't be loaded, not sure what has caused this
>  breakdown).
>
>  I think any tile graphics issues (whichever they are) arise in steps 2 or
>  (more likely) 3.
>
>  Not sure what kind of technologies in these steps you consider yourself able
>  to address....
>
>  Erik.
>

First off...  I'd like to ask for everyone's replies to be
bottom-posted.  Top posting or (even worse) mixed top and bottom
posting makes a thread hard to follow and impossible to do inline
commenting.


Here's my process for the tiles:

>From Marco's tile designer, I export Postscript images. This is mainly
because direct export to SVG doesn't create a file that Batik will
read.

Then, I use pstoedit to convert the postscript to SVG.

Next, I load up the SVG into Inkscape, then flatten and resize the
image into the current format.

Unfortunately, this process doesn't create exactly identical tiles,
because Inkscape resizes each image is slightly different ways
depending on the elements within the image.


So, what I'd like is if someone who is more familiar with the
intricacies of images, could come up with a better process for
creating tiles that are more consistently sized (or reduce/remove the
current tiles' subtle differences).


Secondary to that, we could really use someone who is more familiar
with AWT/Swing than I am. There are several issues in our map drawing
code that I'd like to see cleared up.

---Brett.

Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[Erik V. <eri...@hc...>]

1. If you look into the 18xx CVS repository, under tiles, you'll find a file
TileDictionary.18t, which is a data store maintained by Marco Rocci's Tile
Designer program (see http://www.rails18xx.it/software.html). I have started
from Marco's base version and added a lot of game-specific tiles in the
course of time. 

2. The program allows the export of tile pictures in various formats. We use
both GIF and SVG. Brett can give you any details on how exactly he has done
that (I think he modifies the SVG versions in some way). The resulting files
can also be found in CVS, under tiles/images and tiles/svg.

(For the 18EU specific tiles we use picture files obtained from John
Tamplin, I believe he uses a modified version of Marco's program.).

3. The GIF or SVG tile pictures are loaded, resized, rotated and rendered by
the Rails Java code (classes rails.ui.swing.ImageLoader and
rails.ui.swing.hexmap.GUITile).
(N.B. GIFs currently can't be loaded, not sure what has caused this
breakdown).

I think any tile graphics issues (whichever they are) arise in steps 2 or
(more likely) 3.

Not sure what kind of technologies in these steps you consider yourself able
to address....

Erik.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: rai...@li... 
> [mailto:rai...@li...] On Behalf 
> Of Iain Cheyne
> Sent: Sunday 11 May 2008 16:30
> To: Development list for Rails: an 18xx game
> Subject: Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?
> 
> On 5/10/08, brett lentz <wak...@gm...> wrote:
> > More specifically, by "better tiles", I meant that someone needs to
> >  just spend some time making sure the tiles are all consistent. Make
> >  sure each tile is aligned to the same pixel offsets, etc.
> >
> >  It's time consuming, but it would help make the map look a little
> >  better, and make improving the drawing code an easier process.
> 
> Please could you elaborate a bit more on that? Maybe post the tiles up
> somewhere with instructions? Even if I can't do it, someone else might
> be able to.
> 
> -- 
> Iain
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------
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Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

On 5/10/08, brett lentz <wak...@gm...> wrote:
> More specifically, by "better tiles", I meant that someone needs to
>  just spend some time making sure the tiles are all consistent. Make
>  sure each tile is aligned to the same pixel offsets, etc.
>
>  It's time consuming, but it would help make the map look a little
>  better, and make improving the drawing code an easier process.

Please could you elaborate a bit more on that? Maybe post the tiles up
somewhere with instructions? Even if I can't do it, someone else might
be able to.

-- 
Iain

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

Thanks for the feedback. I am out of town for a few days, but I will
try again when I return.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

On Sat, May 10, 2008 at 1:53 PM, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> http://cheyne.net/tmp/rails/
>
> What do you think?
>
> The main change is the first line that states exactly what Rails is
> and what it can do. I was a bit confused when I first stumbled upon
> Rails, as I thought that it might include an AI.
>
> --
> Iain
>

Well, we'd eventually like to support an AI, but we're not very close
to that (and don't really have anyone interested in developing AI).

That said, I do like the modified description.  The map image is a bit
too big; it overwhelms the text.

Also, I prefer a more structured layout. We've got some distinct
categories of information that we need to provide. Each of them need
to be clear and easy to find. Your changes make it difficult to see
what content the page provides.

Perhaps you can try updating the description without changing the
layout quite so much?

It's a good start. I like the basic idea that you've got. Keep working on it.


---Brett.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

On Sat, May 10, 2008 at 2:06 PM, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> I just noticed that my "role" in SourceForge is as a web designer. As
> you can see from the page, that's not what I do, but I *was* a tech
> writer for a while.
>

Ok.  I've updated your role.


---Brett.

Re: [Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[brett l. <wak...@gm...>]

On Sat, May 10, 2008 at 1:54 PM, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> Brett mentioned that better tiles were needed.
>
> Would this website help?
>
> http://www.18xx.info/tiles/
>
> --
> Iain
>


More specifically, by "better tiles", I meant that someone needs to
just spend some time making sure the tiles are all consistent. Make
sure each tile is aligned to the same pixel offsets, etc.

It's time consuming, but it would help make the map look a little
better, and make improving the drawing code an easier process.

--Brett.

Re: [Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

I just noticed that my "role" in SourceForge is as a web designer. As
you can see from the page, that's not what I do, but I *was* a tech
writer for a while.

On 5/10/08, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
> http://cheyne.net/tmp/rails/
>
>  What do you think?
>
>  The main change is the first line that states exactly what Rails is
>  and what it can do. I was a bit confused when I first stumbled upon
>  Rails, as I thought that it might include an AI.
>
>  --
>
> Iain
>


-- 
Iain

[Rails-devel] Improved tiles?

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

Brett mentioned that better tiles were needed.

Would this website help?

http://www.18xx.info/tiles/

-- 
Iain

[Rails-devel] Slight modifications to the home page

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

http://cheyne.net/tmp/rails/

What do you think?

The main change is the first line that states exactly what Rails is
and what it can do. I was a bit confused when I first stumbled upon
Rails, as I thought that it might include an AI.

-- 
Iain

Re: [Rails-devel] Moderator status?

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

Good news. :o)

Re: [Rails-devel] Moderator status?

[Erik V. <eri...@hc...>]

> Do you have any plans for 1825?
> 
Ultimately, yes, but not likely soon.
Currently, the demand for 1856 seems to be highest. I'm also working on
1835.

After these (or one of these), I consider starting to work on some dearly
lacking generic features:
either route awareness (to restrict tile and token placements and allow
automatic revenue calculation),
or the Holy Grail: internet playability. For the latter I'm considering to
start a discussion on how it can be technically achieved (architecture,
protocols etc).
Perhaps not here but in the 18xx-softdev yahoo group, as the audience is
much larger there.

Erik.

Re: [Rails-devel] Moderator status?

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

On 5/10/08, Iain Cheyne <ia...@ch...> wrote:
>  Incidentally, I am trying to login to the Sourceforge web space, but I
>  am having nightmares getting SSH keys to work.

Typical! No sooner do I publicly whine about something like this and I
get it working...

-- 
Iain

Re: [Rails-devel] Moderator status?

[Iain C. <ia...@ch...>]

On 5/10/08, Erik Vos <eri...@hc...> wrote:
> In fact, the current version has about everything that Lemmi's moderator
>  has,
>  except a correction mode in which you can change *anything*.
>  In addition you have a graphical map.

Thanks! I'll try this out as soon as I can get one of the supported 18xx games.

Do you have any plans for 1825?

Incidentally, I am trying to login to the Sourceforge web space, but I
am having nightmares getting SSH keys to work.

-- 
Iain

Re: [Rails-devel] Moderator status?

[Erik V. <eri...@hc...>]

> > a) Can Rails already be used as a moderator?
> 
> Yes.  I've heard of a couple people just tracking each player's turn
> alongside the physical game.

In fact, the current version has about everything that Lemmi's moderator
has,
except a correction mode in which you can change *anything*.
In addition you have a graphical map.
 
> > b) If not, please can you make the amendments?
> 
> I'm sure the experience could be improved.

I can't think of any such amendments. Suggestions welcome!

Erik.